FRENCHY II : Having a Blast

by George Olney

  Frenchy thought for a minute. "Well, the Galactics have professional dancers, which means they have professional dance instructors. Maybe you can import one of those."

  Dallas giggled. "I don't know about you, babe, but I remember the guy that taught me. I don't think he'd fit in with the boys around here."

  That got an answering grin. "Maybe not, but one of my teachers was a woman and she was pretty hardnosed," Frenchy said. "Maybe you ought to look for one of those. Hell, one of my other teachers was a former ballet dancer and he had muscles like Arnold Schwarznegger! The Federation's pretty big, babe. There has to be someone out there that would be interested and wouldn't mind tribal life."

  "I'll give it a look-see, babe," Dallas replied. "It's worth a try, anyhow. Between Milla and Yarmout's two girls, there's the beginning of a class and that ought to be an inducement to a teacher."

  The comment about Yarmout's girls started Frenchy thinking about Anana, his widow. There was a lot of emotion when she went with Nos to return the sword, but there was pride mixed in with the sorrow. Anana knew that death was always a very real possibility in the Barrens, something everyone lived with every day. She grieved for her dead husband, but she did it without any display and treated Nos with a lot of respect for bringing her husband's sword back. The return of the sword meant a lot to her. It was a sad occasion, but Anana's attitude made Frenchy proud of her adopted boy.

  Another thought about Nos brought a smile to her lips. "You know, babe," she said, "I'm almost certain Nos hasn't said anything to anyone about what happened during the fight, but it looks like he's gotten pretty big in the local teen community anyhow."

  "Word gets around, babe," Dallas replied. "Nos is too good of a guy to say anything about killing that slaver, but, from what I've heard, he's getting a lot of credit for helping save the girls."

  Another slight Frenchy scowl, this time brought on by a Mama thought. "He wears that damn Lee'thal sword any time an adult would normally wear a sword and I wish he wouldn't. At least Grae took the time before Nos left for survival school to give him some extra training on the thing. He'll get more in the survival course if what I understand is right."

  "Do him good," Dallas replied. "The boy's growing up fast. With what's happened to him, he's had to. Don't worry, babe, with you and Grae managing him, he'll turn out right.

  "Besides," she continued with another cheeky grin, "I'm certain Milla's got management plans herself down the road."

  Frenchy smiled and rolled her eyes. "She's going to have to wait a while, but I have to agree with you. I told you the Tribes fall hard and fast when they fall and Milla looks like she's fallen for him. Young Mister Nos had better get used to the fact that someone's got plans for his future, but she can't have him until I've finished with him. They'll both be old enough then."

  "Ah, young love," Dallas said in mock dreamy tones, then giggled. "You know, I'm pretty sure Nos is one big reason Milla asked me to teach her to dance. She told me folks said I was really good and she wanted to be just as good. One of these days, she plans to let Nos see her dance, at which point she has every intention of putting her competition in its proper place. Second place."

  Frenchy grinned. "You have a disciple, babe. Most Tribal girls are sleek and feline, but Milla isn't and I don't think she's ever going to be, either. I'll bet Milla has adopted you as a role model because she's built like you and you're considered exotic among the Tribes."

  Dallas glanced down at her short curvy form, mostly under swirling water at the moment. "Me? Exotic? Sheesh!"

  Both women laughed.

  Frenchy's vid-tex, sitting on a low table near the tub, chose that moment to sound forth with the tone combination that said Grete was calling. Only Frenchy and Dallas knew the music was the "The Ride of the Valkyries". Picking up the ring she normally wore as a remote, Frenchy languidly touched the stud to answer the call. "Hello, Mother. What's up?" she said, turning the ring's video pickup to show herself.

  "A fine day to you, my dear," the projected hologram of Grete answered. "I see you're in the bath. Do you perchance know the whereabouts of your good friend Dallas?"

  Frenchy twisted her hand to aim the pickup at Dallas, who waved pleasantly. "Right here with me. We're taking a little down time."

  "Excellent! And a fine idea at that," Grete said. "Bide there anon and I shall presently arrive. I have a topic I feel needs discussion."

  "As long as we don't have to get out," Frenchy replied, the pickup once again on herself. "Matter of fact, we've got room for you to join us if you'll do me a favor. I've got a pitcher of iced tea in the fridge. Get it and three glasses and we can all relax while talking about whatever it is."

  "Done," Grete said with a smile. "I shall be there with but small delay."

  When Grete walked into the bathroom, she was only wearing a pair of shoes, having walked over undressed to join Frenchy and Dallas in the tub. Frenchy long ago realized that nonchalant public nudity was perfectly normal in the Tribes - and Grete was a law unto herself in any case. She was also carrying the tea pitcher and glasses.

  Giving Grete a quick visual examination, Dallas decided her best friend's mother was just as big and shapely a knockout as her adopted daughter, even if she was actually four hundred years older. Adopted, shmadopted, Dallas decided as Grete poured then passed over two full glasses of iced tea. Grete and Frenchy looked and acted enough alike that anyone not knowing their history would think they really were mother and daughter by birth rather than adoption.

  The thought gave Dallas a warm feeling. After the things Frenchy had gone through on Earth, it was wonderful to know she'd found a real mother at last.

  Grete, sans shoes, eased into the warm swirling water, took a sip of tea, and lay back on her own pillow with a smile. "Daughter," she said in relaxed tones, "I feel I will surely be adding a contrivance such as this to our own quarters anon."

  "It's fun and relaxing," Frenchy replied with a grin. "Relaxing when you need down time and fun when you've got your guy with you. Great for doing a little thinking, too."

  Grete grinned back. "Another wondrous marvel imported from our fair Earth!"

  She turned to Dallas. "Dallas, my dear," she said, "I have a question of some import for you."

  Dallas raised an eyebrow in response.

  "Simply," Grete continued with a warm smile, "would you consider making a permanent home here in the Hold?

  "Oh," Grete waved a hand, "I'm quite aware that your various enterprises, let alone the fact that the man of your choice must travel in order to perform, require your absence a good part of the time. My daughter, after all, shares the same condition of life regarding frequent trips to other locales. Still, our Hold would provide you with a base at which to retreat and recover from the rigors of your ventures."

  Frenchy piped up. "Love to have you here, babe. The trick with what Grete's proposing is that either Jongular or you have to be a member of the tribe before you can set down roots."

  Grete waved her hand again. "That last is not a problem, daughter. Weykhaz and I shall sponsor Dallas before the Tribal Council for membership. I anticipate no problem in that regard as my lord is already on the Council."

  Knowing Grete, there had better be no problem.

  Dallas thought for a moment, her face serious. "You know, guys," she finally said, "I really appreciate what you're offering. I like it here and the Hold's already kind of like a home for me."

  She took a deep breath and looked at Frenchy. "I guess I'm a little like you, babe. You never had a home until you came here and I really haven't had a place since I went into the Marines. Stripping doesn't let you have a home. You just move from club to club and, even when I set up my site, I really wasn't ready to settle down."

  Dallas grinned at both women. "Whatever I want, I'm pretty sure I can get Joe to agree with me."

  "That guy's got it bad," Frenchy shot wryly.

  Dallas gave her friend another cheeky grin. "Yep."

  Then she
mellowed. "I do too. More than that, though. Joe's been footloose since he started performing. I don't think he'll mind a little stability, even if it's not in his own tribe. For that matter, we can always go back to his people to visit when we want.

  "Okay," Dallas said firmly, "here we are and here Joe and I are going to settle."

  They toasted the decision.

  Dallas leaned back against her pillow with a sigh. "This is the life, babe. We're going to put one of these in our place when we get a permanent one. I'll bet Nos would like one of these right now, depending on how survival school is going."

  "Worry not about my grandson," Grete said as she nestled back in her own pillow, eyes closed. "He is enjoying himself to the fullest as we speak."

  "He's having the time of his life," Frenchy added, then frowned slightly. "I just don't like the idea of my little boy in survival school. Oh, it's necessary and it's good for him and I know he's enjoying it, but he's still my kid and I wish he didn't have to do it."

  "Open your eyes, babe," Dallas told her cheerfully. "He's not much of a little boy these days. Growth spurt. Putting on muscle, too. He'll never be a really big guy like Grae or some of the rest of the tribesmen, but he won't be a little wimp, either"

  Frenchy had to smile at that. She was proud of the way Nos was developing, even if it meant his little boy days were over. "His parents weren't big people. From what I could tell from the images I saw, I'm taller than his real dad, much less his mom. On the other hand, my educated guess is that Nos will end up big enough and tough enough to command respect wherever he goes."

  "As is only right for a grandson of mine," Grete capped the dialogue. "For myself, I'm glad he is well out of the slaving episode."

  Frenchy's smile this time was predatory. "Oh, not completely, mother. Grae thinks we just might need his testimony when we arrest the son of a bitch that dreamt up that prison camp for the girls. It's going to take a couple of months before we know who it is, but we found some things that indicate the same guy gave the orders to kill Nos's parents, too. That means Nos is involved. The problem is that the jerk is probably pretty high up the corporate food chain, so we aren't going to just walk in and grab the bastard. We want our case so tight it's lawyer proof.

  "The nice thing about Federation law is that there's a way to do just that." Frenchy's predatory smile turned evil. "And we will."

  "Is this the same mob dude that picked me up in Seelah?" Dallas asked.

  Frenchy shook her head. "That guy was Baltan's boss. I saw the mental imagery Interrogation got from Baltan and the pictures looked like the guy that grabbed you and Fuzzy. I was just behind Daddy and I got a good look at your mob guy before he bailed out of the fight, so I'm sure.

  "Right now, Correlation thinks the kidnapping group and the Seelah organization were two separate operations by two different kingpins. We've about cleaned up the Seelah gang anyhow."

  "What happened to the mob dude? Have you got him yet?" Dallas asked.

  Frenchy settled back further on her pillow. "He vanished. As near as we can tell, it was about the time we cleaned up Baltan's gang.

  "Doesn't matter," she continued in a relaxed voice. "He's gone to ground somewhere right now, but he'll stick his head up sooner or later. When he does, we'll take it off."

  #####

  "So here we are, bucolic and under the sensor sweep of nearly everybody!" Alesos punctuated that expansive remark with an equally expansive wave of his right hand. The wave took in the small spaceport behind them, the varied trees and sundry vegetables in the tropical vistas that spread out in all directions, the small town near the terminal, and the shining emerald sea in the near distance. "Facilities, as you have no doubt noted, Boraz, are underdeveloped and minimal. I would expect law enforcement to be equally primitive, thus easily avoided."

  "So what do we do now, boss?" The question was valid from Boraz's point of view. He and Alesos were standing on the concourse that fronted the small port terminal, their luggage on a robot carrier trailing behind them, all landing formalities - such as they were - complete. In point of fact, they were now officially on Setton's World and free to do whatever they - read: Alesos - wished.

  Alesos surveyed the portion of town nearest the space port, primarily low one and two story buildings fronting dirt streets that contained a relaxed, slow, sparse traffic. As was normal everywhere, Galactics were visible among the less than numerous flow of locals going about their business - tourists, as it happened. Mixed in with the tourists were fit young men and women with beautiful tans topped by long, tousled, sun bleached hair, and carrying peculiar looking grav surf boards. If the hair and boards weren't enough of a giveaway, the men were all attired in nothing but sandals and long baggy pantaloons, tied at the ankles and waist, while the women also wore sandals matched with sleeveless smocks that came to mid-thigh. In other words, both were wearing the unofficial uniform of the career grav surfer. Unknown to Alesos, among a great number of other things about Setton's World, the planet was considered the galactic mecca for grav surfing due to the fact the only land masses were islands of varying sizes and the structure of waves off most of the beaches was considered optimum for grav surfing. The term in surf lingo was "gnostic", after Phorst Kol Gnost, the first great grav surfer. The title Phorst meant chief priest of his island nation. Kol Gnost was considered the guiding spirit of grav-surfng and he figured in a favorite surfer benediction.

  Alesos ignored the tourists and surfers to give the locals a close look. Large men wearing sarongs printed with contrasting bright colors, frequently their only garment, received only a cursory study. No profit there. He spent more time on the shapely local women. Their native costume consisted of a big loop of large exotically colorful flowers, falling to cover their breasts, and what amounted to a none too large square of brightly colored cloth tied around the waist in a fashion that allowed one point of the square to fall half way down a hip. The obvious dress of primitives. Alesos didn't make the connection that the youthful appearance and fit physical condition of the locals showed that galactic medicine was in use, which in turn implied a much closer connection with Federation civilization than was apparent on the surface.

  The lack of female clothing didn't interest Alesos (much). Instead he was thinking of the fantastic monetary possibilities of a slave stock made up from these exotically beautiful, quite curvaceous women. There was a great deal of profit to be made here.

  Pointing to a line of colorful (well, garishly decorated in multiple wildly clashing colors complete with dangling beads and tassels) vehicles, Alesos ordered, "Those appear to be taxis. Choose one and tell the driver we want to go to a hotel."

  This got the usual response. "Yes, boss."

  "Wait." Alesos commanded then assumed the dramatic expression that said he was Thinking Deep Thoughts. "Once we get there, we'll check in then you go to the desk and book us on some kind of tourist excursion."

  "Yes, boss." Slight pause. "Uh, boss, why do we want to go on a tour?"

  Alesos beamed at his assistant. "Because, idiot, I can think of no better way to conduct an unobtrusive reconnaissance of the area! While we are neatly camouflaged by the crowds observing the primitives that inhabit this backwater, we can scan the area for possibilities and gain some basis for formulating future operations.

  "A stroke of genius," he congratulated himself.

  Despite the big words, Boraz got the idea, if not the rationale. "Yes, boss."

  There were a number of stops on the tour. Alesos felt he'd hit pay dirt on the third one, a large village perched on a high bluff overlooking a small bay. The tour guide went into some sort of boring spiel involving the "wonderfully colorful" culture and its ancient "horribly grisly" customs, being rewarded with utter fascination by tourists who personally were, of course, repulsed by every bloody part of the repugnant tale and couldn't get enough of it. While everyone else was concentrating on the tour guide's words, Alesos felt the time was ripe to drift off and, taking Boraz, make a close
r study of the locals with eventual fell intent in mind.

  He and Boraz were strolling through a cluster of multiform constructions made of local vegetation that were just too big and complex to be termed huts when a familiar and highly unwelcome female voice came from behind them.

  "Oh, you bad man that kidnapped me and Dallas from Frenchy's house! I think you better go far from here very fast before I call my husband and Daddy. Daddy come, Husband come, and you in big trouble...." There was a great deal more along this line, of course, since the speaker was Fuzzy.

  Alesos verified the fact to his shock as soon as he whirled to locate the gushing font of words. He ignored the long and continuous sequence of sentences as his mind tried to wrestle with the fact that the damned little honey blonde was standing there just feet away and looking at him. At first, he wanted to grab the girl and make her shut up before her Daddy - well remembered with horror - showed up. Then he decided leaving now was the best option.

  Unfortunately, neither the grabbing nor the leaving option shortly became practical.

  Fuzzy's face lit up like a searchlight and she burst forth with another torrent of speech. "Oh! No need to call Daddy! He's here! Now you got trouble..."

  There was more, a whole lot more, but Alesos didn't notice. All of his attention was on the hand about the size of an industrial dirt scoop tightly grasping his shoulder. The hand, as he looked behind him in near panic, was connected to an appropriately large arm, which in turn was connected to a tremendously large body, which, in its own turn, was topped by a suitably sizable shaven head decorated with fearsome tattoos. Daddy.

  Boraz, meanwhile, had a problem of his own. Husband. When he'd spun to get his boss out of trouble he found himself looking up into the highly unfriendly eyes of a Watanaoean warrior only a tiny touch smaller than Daddy, but equally fearsome. Life suddenly sucked.